Region & History

Where does hops grow in England besides Kent? Mainly here, in the hills of Herefordshire and Worcestershire on the border with Wales. As early as 1692 hops were sold in Hereford, and in the 19th century this sideline of farmers grew into an industry branch. The county archives record around 4,500 acres of hop gardens for 1850, about 6,000 for 1878, and more than 10,000 acres for the record year 1894.

The hop gardens crowded into the valleys of the Lugg and the Frome. Bromyard, Bishops Frome, Bosbury, Leominster and Tenbury each had more than 300 acres. For the harvest, picker families came from the towns of the West Midlands and from Wales out into the countryside, a summer outing combining hard work with a bed in the barn.

Brewing took place in Hereford long before the age of the big breweries. The Hereford and Tredegar Brewery closed its operation in the city in 1960. After that, the area remained a cider land for a long time: H. P. Bulmer founded his company in Hereford in 1887, the firm that turned cider into a brand.

Beer came back in the 1980s. Peter Amor, a former Guinness brewer, founded the Wye Valley Brewery in 1985. It began on the site of the Nags Head in Canon Pyon, moved to the stable yard of a pub in Hereford in 1986, and has worked out of the former cider factory in Stoke Lacy since 2002. The Teme Valley Brewery in Worcestershire has been brewing since 1997 and, by its own account, uses only hops from the two counties.

There is no EU protected designation of origin for beer from this area. Of English beers, only Kentish ale carries such a registration, along with Rutland Bitter. So if you order a bitter here, you won't get a protected name, but a style with a regional signature.